


Ransom

by severinne



Series: The Wind and Its Satellite [17]
Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Desert, Dirty Talk, Jealousy, M/M, Motorcycle Sex, Threesome - M/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-09
Updated: 2011-06-09
Packaged: 2017-10-20 06:29:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/209755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/severinne/pseuds/severinne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After waiting three years, Jim doesn't think that stealing a moment for himself is too much to ask.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ransom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [norfolkdumpling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/norfolkdumpling/gifts).



> An unplanned addition to The Wind and Its Satellite and written for Norfolkdumpling who provided the visual inspiration via Chris Pine's Details outtakes and bribed me with shiny icons. I'm weak that way.

The dip of the sun across the sky’s blue arc struck the side of the motorcycle hard, made chrome gleam on one side while submerging the other in shadows that threw themselves down upon the desert sand. In this heat, that darker pool of land would have been the sensible place to lay one’s body down – provided Jim had ever been predisposed to sense.

Thighs flexing in fitted riding leathers, Jim adjusted the sprawl of his legs across the heated earth, punching idly at the pillow his jacket made at the small of his back. He tipped his head back against the boulder he had found for his waiting place, sunning his throat with a peaceful smile. The heat throbbed pleasantly against his upturned face, over his bared arms and across the swathes of skin tingling with anticipation beneath the remains of his riding gear. Sweat made his t-shirt cling to his chest and stomach but Jim left it undisturbed, drawing his concentration outward instead to the hard-soft weight of desert moaning beneath him as galloping hooves drew nearer. Tempting as it was to watch what he knew was coming, Jim kept his eyes closed and smiled at his private conjuring of that sight as a horse cantered to a stop somewhere to his left, eased to stillness by a low and soothing tongue.

‘Damn it, Jim, you’ll catch your death by heat stroke lounging about like that out here.’

Eyes still closed, Jim’s smile widened. Not so soothing, but that acerbic tone was no less welcome. ‘You took your time,’ he murmured.

‘Had the devil of a job tracking your homing beacon this far off the grid,’ Bones huffed back, undercut by the derisive snort of his all too familiar mount. ‘Heat interferes with the readings.’

‘Mmn.’ Jim squinted one eye open, and sucked in a short breath. His imagination was nothing to the vision Bones made sat astride his palomino, powerful denim-clad thighs holding the horse’s strength in check. ‘Maybe you should stop looking so hot in the first place.’

Bones rolled his eyes as he gracefully slid down from Tara’s saddle. ‘I meant that infernal sun, idiot,’ he muttered, swiftly stripping off his long-sleeved outer shirt and mopping irritably at his brow. The thin white undershirt beneath was damply taut across Bones’ wide shoulders. ‘Don’t know what you were thinking taking that deathtrap out here in the first place,’ he said with a stormy glare at Jim’s idle motorcycle. ‘Sand must’ve clogged up the works.’

‘Guess so.’

‘Which wouldn’t have happened if you’d just taken Foxtrot for a ride instead,’ Bones added accusingly. ‘Chris’ horses are used to these conditions. Your bike isn’t.’

‘Lesson learned, then, isn’t it?’ Jim sat up and fixed Bones with a slow smirk. ‘Unless you wanted to spank it into me while we’re out here.’

With his skin already flushed from the Mojave heat, Jim was compelled to read Bones’ bashful reaction in the slightest softening of his sneering mouth. ‘C’mon,’ he said with a short jerk of his head. ‘You can ride with me on Tara. We’ll send a retrievals drone for your idiot bike once we’re back at the ranch.’

‘Nah, that’s alright.’

‘Sorry?’ Bones crossed his arms across his broad chest, eyebrow already twitching forebodingly.

‘I said, forget about it.’ Jim shrugged. ‘It’s all fine.’

Bones sputtered, glancing rapidly between Jim’s boneless sprawl in the sand and the nearby bike. ‘If it’s _all fine_ ,’ he echoed sarcastically, ‘why the hell am I here? And how the hell are you getting back to the ranch?’

‘I’m riding my bike.’ With a grin, Jim picked up a dull metal cylinder from his side and tossed it towards Bones, who stifled his disbelief just long enough to snatch it from mid-air. ‘Turns out she runs just fine without that bit. Who knew?’

The threatening eyebrow snapped fully upright to the sweating tips of Bones’ fringe as he turned the cylinder over in his hands, then threw it aside with a harsh, exasperated sound. ‘You already fixed your bike,’ he said blankly.

‘Yup.’

‘ _You…_ ’ Bones aborted what promised to be a blistering rant with a muttered curse, shoving his hair off his forehead. ‘You sent a distress call back to the ranch,’ he spat.

‘That’s right.’

‘You made me ride all over this desert looking for you!’ Eyes growing wide and wild, Bones stalked forward, boots kicking up dust in his wake. ‘What the hell were you thinking?’

Once Bones was towering and seething over him, Jim rose to his knees to give his answer, palming over tensed thighs and brushing his unshaven jaw against the rasping denim covering Bones’ groin. Jim heard the sharp intake of Bones’ breath, the biting edge of a moan before he jerked back.

‘ _Fuck,_ ’ he hissed, staring down at Jim, hands clenching at his sides. ‘Are you kidding me?’

‘Does it look like I’m kidding?’ Flashing another grin, Jim edged forward again on his knees and pushed a hand around Bones’ hip to grope at his ass.

‘No,’ Bones agreed reluctantly, eyes narrowing as he hovered between outrage and arousal. ‘No, it really doesn’t.’ Something in between the two reactions seemed to win out as Bones evaded his touch again, taking another step back. ‘What the hell, Jim?’

The confusion in Bones’ eyes demanded a straight answer, so Jim sighed and sat back on his heels. ‘Just thought it’d be fun to have a bit of one-on-one time together,’ he said casually. ‘What’s wrong with that?’

Bones deflated slightly. ‘Nothing’s wrong with that, Jim.’ He stared off across the desolate stretch of the Mojave, lips pressed thin. ‘But you could’ve just _asked_.’

‘Maybe I didn’t want to have to ask,’ he replied, fighting and failing to keep the sullen edge out of his voice. ‘Maybe I just wanted to have you to myself.’

The tension in Bones’ stance bled away, leaving him looking smaller, diminished in a way that made Jim wince inwardly with regret. ‘Could’ve been Chris who came out after you,’ he said softly, eyes still scanning the horizon. ‘You had no way of knowing…’

‘Bullshit. I knew it’d be you.’ Jim craned his head back, reading Bones’ self-doubt with a squinting frown. ‘If Chris saw that message, he’d wait for me to fix the problem myself just to prove a point. Only _you_ would drop everything to come out here for me.’

Startled, Bones blinked rapidly down at him, then let loose a long sigh. ‘Damn it, kid.’ He dropped to his knees in the desert dust and pulled Jim forward into a slow, affectionate kiss. Slightly dry lips moved gently against his own, sweetened by the faintest trace of Bones’ tongue teasing over his parched mouth. Jim opened readily for him, silently asking for more and releasing a frustrated moan when Bones withdrew his kiss and dragged him into a tight embrace instead.

‘You idiot,’ he said in a low whisper, nosing at the sweat beading on Jim’s neck. ‘You know you don’t need to ask… and you damn well don’t have to pull foolish stunts like this to spend some time alone together, not if that’s what you wanted…’

For a shuddering moment, Jim let himself burrow into the reassuring weight of Bones’ arms, inhaling the sweat mingling with Bones’ musky scent. He could feel the other man’s every protective instinct bearing down around him and it would have been so easy to pour all the mess of himself out into the scarce space between them but he hadn’t come out here for conversation. He turned the clinging of his body into a shimmy that pushed him tighter against Bones, hips pressing hard together. Bones dropped back into the sand with a low grunt and Jim grinned as he followed him down, crowding forward until he had Bones where he wanted him – down on his back, framed by Jim’s arms braced in the dirt.

‘Jim…’ He breathed it out, gazing up through shuttered eyes that revealed only a thin splinter of sun-pierced hazel. ‘Do we… do you need to talk, or…?’

Still smiling, Jim leaned down and answered the question with a kiss, deeper and hotter than before. It was both an evasion and an honest answer; he may still be learning how to be with Bones and Chris together, but he already knew everything he needed to know about each man on their own terms. With Chris it was daring innuendo wrapped up in the comfort of mutual admiration and respect; with Bones it was _this_ , all the snark and bluster that could only come from fiercest affection. He didn’t need to talk because he _knew_ Bones, nearly better than he knew himself. He knew Bones would accept his silence and his kiss as answer, knew from the hungry little moan warming his tongue that even the roundabout ride across the desert for this was more than forgiven.

Hands settled hot above the waistband of Jim’s riding leathers, finding the narrow strip of skin beneath the hem of his shirt and cinching it higher to further expose his body to sun and touch. Jim groaned, spine melting beneath exploring fingers as he plastered himself tight to Bones’ body beneath him, making his need to have clothing peeled away elsewhere obvious in the thrust of his hips against Bones’ horseback-honed thigh.

Breaking their kiss with a gasping backward snap of his head, Bones scrambled over Jim’s back with both hands, seizing his leather-clad ass in two greedy palms. ‘Easy there, kid,’ he hushed, belying his words with an insistent push and pull that invited Jim to ride Bones’ thigh, trapped cock rutting over flexing muscle in a demanding rhythm. ‘Tell me what you want.’ Bones closed his eyes against the blinding sky above. ‘No asking… just tell me, and I’ll do it.’

Jim moaned softly, fingers clawing into desert sand as he wrestled down a premature rush of arousal at that promise. Forcing his hips to still, he pressed tight to Bones’ thigh as his eyes searched that sun-dusked face, the trusting brush of eyelashes against cheekbones, the anticipatory slip of tongue damping a parched lower lip. ‘Your mouth,’ he decided breathlessly. ‘I want your mouth.’

‘That so.’ A tiny smile tugged at those sensual lips. ‘Gonna need to be a bit more specific than that.’

His drawling innocence poorly concealed a teasing dare, and Jim smirked as he lowered himself flat to Bones’ gently heaving chest and craned his head to tilt directly into his ear. ‘I want your mouth all over my cock,’ he whispered, injecting the words with every ounce of the authority he had learned from Chris. ‘You’re going to lick every inch of me like you’re dying for it, and when I’m good and wet I’m going to slip right between those pretty cocksucking lips of yours and fuck your face until I come down your throat.’

From this close, Jim could feel the shiver that raced through Bones’ body despite the oppressive heat. ‘Show me,’ he growled, twisting his head around to ghost a kiss over Jim’s panting lips. ‘Show me that cock, show me how bad you want it…’

Jim nipped back at his mouth before pushing hard off the ground, sitting back on his heavy-booted heels straddling Bones’ hips. Staring down into Bones’ rapt face, he rested a hand over his throbbing groin, squeezing himself gently and rubbing a thumb down the hard ridge of his cock straining against the leather. Eager as he was to tease out a bit of a show, Bones was rapidly outpacing his performance just by laying docile and sharp-eyed between his legs, hair falling back from his sweating brow and arms dropped carelessly above his head. Unable to contain the ache in his groin any longer, Jim carefully tugged down the zip on his pants, feeling Bones’ hard stare on his fingers and hearing his short huff of laughter as his cock sprang free.

‘Figured you couldn’t be wearing much under those things,’ Bones remarked dryly, eyebrow arching as Jim took himself into a loose grip and lightly stroked his waiting length.

‘Had a good look, did you?’ Bones rolled his eyes.

‘Damn right I did.’

With a smirk, Jim shuffled forward until his knees nudged under Bones’ upraised arms, threading his fingers through Bones’ disheveled hair. Bones craned his neck to meet him halfway and Jim moaned as the flat of a slick tongue slaked the razor edge of his lust in a hungry sweep that took in his gripping fingers and ended with a slow swirl around the head. That first taste pushed their urgency faster forward, Bones scrambling to prop himself up on his elbows and Jim clawing for a better hold in his hair until they arrived at some perfect precipice where Jim clung on for dear life while Bones lavished every lewd attention imaginable over his cock. The tantalizing drag of his tongue whisked cooling relief around him in the dry desert air before Bones took him into the melting heat of his mouth, suffusing Jim with liquid pleasure as Bones’ throat worked tight around him while the tip of his tongue played the vein throbbing along his length. He was rapidly nearing the endpoint of the desires he had whispered so crudely in Bones’ ear only minutes before so Jim allowed himself only a few blissful moments more inside that welcoming depth before pulling back with a wistful groan.

‘Change of plan,’ he gasped out, grinning at the debauched red of Bones’ panting lips. ‘Come on.’ Jim clambered to his feet, pulling Bones up with him and walking him backward until they stumbled up against the side of his motorcycle where it stood upright in its hoverbrake. Stifling Bones’ grumbling objection with a searing kiss, Jim lapped up the flavour of his own arousal as he fumbled with the flies of Bones’ jeans, tugging harshly at the heavy fabric and the underwear beneath. He gave Bones’ hard cock a few appreciative strokes before reaching around and groping the round, inviting curve of his ass.

‘Still no asking?’ Jim pushed their hips together, messily aligning their cocks and thrusting through the thin sheen of sweat between them. With a strangled groan, Bones rocked back against him, one hand flying back to brace against the bike’s seat.

‘No asking,’ he agreed breathlessly. ‘Just tell me, damn it.’

Jim swallowed a greedy groan, squeezed Bones’ ass harder. ‘Think I’d rather show you.’ Holding Bones in place with the full length of his body, Jim reached sideways and rummaged through the bike’s small side compartment. Bones watched him closely, smirking when Jim triumphantly waved the small bottle aloft, golden oil catching the sun’s sharp rays.

‘At least you planned ahead.’ Bones’ drawl was dryly amused, speaking the eyeroll Jim didn’t see in his haste to turn his lover to face the bike. ‘Should’ve seen that one coming.’ He canted his hips back obligingly as Jim slung an arm around him and rubbed the length of his cock up between his buttocks.

‘You think I’m going to fuck you.’ Nuzzling the back of Bones’ neck, Jim uncapped the bottle one-handed, the other fondling the silken heat of Bones’ erection.

‘All signs are pointing that way, yeah.’ Far from sounding disappointed, Bones writhed expectantly within the circle of his arm. Jim indulged him for a feverish spell, thrusting convincingly in time to the faster jerking of his cock before letting off with a gentle bite to his shoulder.

‘And when,’ he asked sweetly, ‘have you ever known me to be so predictable?’

Still clutching Bones fast against him, Jim raised the bottle and poured a steady stream of delicately scented oil over the seat of his motorcycle, watching in anticipation as a slick puddle spread itself invitingly over the molded leather. Impossibly, his cock hardened even further at the sight, while Bones’ entire body stiffened within his grasp.

‘Jim…?’

‘I’m not asking, and neither should you.’ A darker, deeper tone rumbled through his throat as Jim dropped the bottle back into its compartment and ran his hand lovingly over the curve of his bike’s seat, testing the frictionless glide of his skin over the sun-warmed leather. ‘I will tell you this… I’m not going to fuck you. At least, not the way you had in mind.’

‘What the hell…’

Jim cut him off with an oiled hand around his cock, fisting his objections into an incoherent moan. ‘But if you go ahead and fuck my bike here like I’m _telling_ you to, I’ll let you have some of my fingers in your ass at the same time.’

‘ _Fuck_.’ Bones squirmed, still held captive by Jim’s arm now hooked tight across his chest. With his chin resting on his broad shoulder, Jim could see the disbelieving lust-glazed stare he cast down upon the bike, the pinch of his teeth into his plush lower lip as Jim stroked him through his hesitation. ‘I… I don’t know what you want me to do,’ he said finally, hoarse with shame that Jim tried to soothe away with an affectionate nibble at his ear.

‘I’ll show you,’ he promised, nudging Bones encouragingly forward. Perhaps he had failed to account for Bones’ skittish apprehension around machines but the hoverbrake kept the bike perfectly stable and upright as he helped Bones out of his jeans and underwear and, with a lot more effort, back into his riding boots. Bones grumbled generously through the ordeal but let himself be pushed down low over the bike’s sleek profile, boot heels planted on the back pegs and hands white-knuckled around the handlebars. A low, plaintive moan echoed from his downward hanging head as Jim reached between his legs to adjust the angle of his exposed cock where it lay trapped between the seat and Bones’ clenching abdomen.

‘Still hard, I see.’ Jim thumbed the slick length of him and trailed his hand around to rest reassuringly at the small of his back. ‘Not so bad, is it?’

The first muttered words of Bones’ reply were incoherent but undeniably irate. ‘Feel ridiculous,’ he spat out in louder conclusion.

‘You look amazing,’ he corrected, low and awestruck at the parallel grace of Bones’ lean body over the aerodynamic lines of his ride. Following the curve of his spine, Jim pushed his clinging shirt higher up his back, drinking in the display of tanned skin from shoulder blades to rounded ass, all that bared flesh made more deliciously perverse by the dusty boots climbing up his muscled calves. ‘So hot…’

Jim circled the bike, pouring possessive fingertips and dirty-minded praise over his prize as he retrieved the oil and poured another smaller puddle into the beckoning dip at the small of Bones’ back. The sudden splash of moisture made Bones buck and gasp, a shock that Jim hastened to calm by rubbing the slick oil into the taut muscles of his back even as he coated his fingers with the glistening fluid. He massaged and murmured through Bones’ begrudging moans, trying to ease the apprehension written into his tightly drawn body and finally finding his surrender in the first press of an oiled finger down between his spread cheeks. With that touch, Bones did several things in rapid succession: whine breathlessly, twitch away, and groan raggedly as he slipped forward in the bike’s seat in his efforts to escape.

Jim bit back his own aroused moan at the sight. ‘Come back here,’ he ordered softly, as gently as he could. He watched avidly as Bones’ shoulders heaved unevenly, then tensed as he pushed against the leverage of the handlebars, sliding back over the seat with a shaken gasp of pleasure into Jim’s waiting hand. Pausing to reward him with a few teasing circles of his finger around his furled hole, he leaned down and nipped the curve of his ass before speaking again.

‘Now go and come back again.’

With a few more murmured commands and the occasional prodding touch, Bones was soon riding the slicked leather of the bike’s seat with sensual abandon. Powerful arms and legs braced his body as his hips rubbed the length of his cock back and forth in a hypnotic rhythm undercut by rough-edged moans that escalated to a hoarse cry when Jim stopped him with a firm hand at the small of his back, holding him still as he worked a finger into his ass. Even beneath his restraining hand, Bones rocked subtly over the bike with a muffled whimper, helpless to stop moving now that he had started.

‘Look at you,’ he breathed, pushing a second finger in alongside the first, shuddering as he felt Bones stretch easily around him. ‘Not so shy now… fucking yourself on my hand while you fuck my bike… bet you couldn’t stop humping that thing now even if you wanted to…’

‘Damn it…’ Bones growled and twisted his head around, a fresh flush of blood high on his cheekbones. ‘Yes, you twisted bastard, whatever you want but _damn it_ , let me go or _move your damn fingers already._ ’

‘What, like this?’ Jim plunged his fingers deeper and nudged the tight walls of him until Bones jerked beneath his hand with a muffled shout. His cock throbbed at the sound, and Jim moaned eagerly as he pressed his groin into Bones’ leg, seeking some much-needed friction from the flexing muscles of his thigh. Rapidly losing the strength of will needed to keep Bones pinned down against the bike, Jim let his restraining hand drift slickly over his arching back and heaving sides, coasting over the movement of his body as his fingers fucked Bones’ hole at a quickening pace. Every glance of Jim’s fingertips over his prostate wrenched a fresh and wanton moan from Bones, helplessly absorbed in the rut of his hips between the motorcycle and Jim’s hand.

‘You look so fucking good like this,’ he murmured, knees wobbling beneath him as the hot press of Bones’ thigh against his cock made his blood race with lust, with jealousy for all that writhing naked flesh when his riding leathers clung so maddeningly to his skin. ‘Practically begging me to climb on and ride you hard…’

A full-bodied quiver shook through Bones, trembled tight around Jim’s fingers. ‘Do it,’ he groaned, hips tilting restlessly backward. ‘Do it… fuck me, Jim, please…’

The broken, pleading edge in his voice was beyond tempting, but Jim choked down the idea and snared his wandering hand firmly in the tangled band of Bones’ t-shirt, forcing him down flat against the bike’s seat. ‘If I did that, I couldn’t watch _this_ , could I?’ Eyes roving hungrily over his shaking, rutting body, he ground his hips into Bones’ leg nearly as hard as Bones was grinding into the bike. ‘I’m not letting you off this bike, not letting you go back to Chris,’ he hissed between laboured breaths, ‘not until I’ve seen you come all over my bike like the dirty slut he trained you to be… not until you’re screaming my name with my fingers fucking your tight, greedy ass…’

The raw possessiveness tumbled unchecked from Jim’s lips, leaving a hollow ache of fear in its place that was soon flooded with the satisfaction of seeing Bones twist beneath his hands and shudder out his orgasm, his lithe body shivering taut as he poured his pleasure out on a low and filthy whimper. Jim forced his fisted hand around Bones’ gathered shirt to relax, reluctantly sliding his fingers out of the pulsing heat of his ass and murmuring nonsense noises to make up for the harsh words that had taken them to this.

‘Jim…’ One of Bones’ hands dropped from the bike’s handlebars, flailed feebly backward. Jim let himself be dragged sideways, an embarrassingly needy note escaping his throat when shaky fingers found his aching cock standing upright from his open trousers.

‘Oh…’ He squirmed helplessly into the first tentative stroke, every inch of his skin beneath his constricting clothing desperate for touch even as an indescribable guilt held him back from accepting even more of his lover’s generosity. ‘You don’t have to… I can just…’

‘Shut up, Jim.’ Exertion roughened his oversexed drawl as Bones squirmed far too distractingly over the leather seat, the muscles of his back purring beneath glistening skin as he pushed up and around on a braced elbow. ‘I’m not asking, either.’

Bones’ hand abandoned his cock and closed around his leather-clad ass with surprising strength, pulling him forward and into the slick heat of his mouth. With a shocked cry, Jim scrambled to hold himself up as he was consumed by those demanding lips and lascivious tongue, one hand grabbing the handlebars while the other wound itself into the damp strands of Bones’ hair. His eyes drifted downward in disbelief, taking in the fine balance of Bones’ lean body twisted over the bike, naked skin shining with an erotic patina of sweat and oil and come that Jim ached to lick clean. Overwhelmed by the sight, he slammed his eyes shut and tugged at Bones’ hair in unspoken warning but he was already gone, hips snapping out a quick staccato as he came in several long pulses down Bones’ willing throat. He groaned and gasped for air, the Mojave’s heat smothering heavier than before as he clung weakly to the bike and Bones, eyes blinking open again to take in flickering snapshots of a swollen mouth lingering over his depleted cock, tumbling over the folds of leather pulled taut from his hips. The blind affection of those lips sent a fresh twinge of guilt through Jim’s chest that he tried to shove away with a loving sweep through Bones’ hair and a light smile when those hazel eyes flashed upward.

‘And that’s one advantage a motorcycle has over any horse,’ he said helpfully.

The satiated lust glazing Bones’ eyes cleared with a suddenly startled panic. ‘Tara…’ He sat up abruptly and twisted around, bringing a wider grin to Jim’s lips as Bones both sagged in relief and blushed to find his horse staring mutely back at them, chewing ponderously on a mouthful of green desert scrub. With a chuckle, Jim ruffled Bones’ mussed hair into further disorder as he stepped back to carefully zip his pants closed.

‘Nothing she hasn’t seen before,’ he pointed out.

Bones sighed, then nodded. ‘Fair enough,’ he agreed, though he kept his head bashfully ducked as he peeled off his t-shirt and wiped at the semen spattering his skin. ‘Between you and Chris… the poor girl must be traumatized.’

‘Luckiest horse in the world if you ask me.’

A roll of his eyes was Bones’ only answer as he stiffly dismounted the bike and threw his shirt over the bike’s stained seat. He stretched his arms over his head and rolled his neck, utterly unaware of the pornographic spectacle he was making of himself, compact muscles still slick in the sun, naked save for his riding boots and, Jim noted, the heavy ring on the smallest finger of his left hand.

As though sensing the direction of Jim’s narrowed gaze, Bones shrugged away the ache in his muscles and glanced back across the desert’s yawning horizon. ‘Chris is gonna know what we’ve been up to the second we get back, y’know,’ he remarked absently, turning his eyes to the ground in search of his jeans.

‘Is that a problem?’

‘Course not.’ A private smirk pulled at Bones’ reddened lips as he shook the dust out of his pants. ‘He’ll just be more than a little excited to hear all the dirty details. I’m sure that overactive mouth of yours can handle that,’ he added with a fond glance upward that warmed its way deep into Jim’s belly. The idea of whispering every lewd detail of Bones’ debauchery into Chris’ ear while teasing out every inch of the older man’s arousal with a groping hand down his pants was already taking shape at the back of his mind and making his skin itch all over again, but it wasn’t enough to keep Jim from crowding into Bones once more, catching him while still stripped bare and sweating just for him.

‘I’ll tell him everything,’ he agreed. ‘Tell him exactly how gorgeous you looked riding my bike. But I’m still glad that it was Tara who got to see and not him.’

Bones opened his mouth, both ready to object and hesitating to speak but Jim smudged out the words with a thumb against his lips. ‘He had three years of you without having to share,’ he said fervently. ‘I’ll take what I can get.’

Regrets flooded Bones’ eyes, but Jim couldn’t tell where it was directed when he finally answered. ‘You’ll have more than three years to make up the difference,’ he said quietly. ‘Once we’re back in space.’

Jim’s heart nearly broke at the quiet truth. There were three years and something more etched into the downcast eyes that clearly wished they hadn’t said anything at all, three years reaching an ending of sorts so Bones could follow him into the stars. That realization rolled over the jealousy Jim had never dared to speak out loud, and left him feeling flatly cruel in its wake for taking that sacrifice for granted.

‘Hey.’ A warm palm rasped the stubble on Jim’s jaw, coaxing him to look into Bones’ worried face. He hated to see even more furrows than usual between his heavy eyebrows but they soon vanished from view as he leaned in to press a gentle kiss to his tightened lips. After all the rough urgency of before, this patient glide of mouths was sweetly calm but no less impassioned. ‘You know we can still talk about this,’ he murmured, pressing his sweating brow to Jim’s. ‘Any time you want. Just say the word.’

‘I know.’ But the taste of his release on Bones’ lips and the sincerity of his words sated the sour shame on his tongue. ‘Maybe later,’ he decided with a small smile. ‘Let’s get back to that sexy Admiral of ours.’

‘Mmn.’ Bones’ hum was agreeable if not entirely convinced, but the parting kiss Bones swept over his lips was no less affectionate than before. Stumbling back, Jim slouched against his bike, absently using Bones’ shirt to wipe down the seat while his eyes raked over every sleek line of his lover as he disappeared into his discarded clothes.

‘Here.’ Jim caught the leather jacket Bones threw to him and met his searching look with a wink and a smile as he shrugged it on, waiting until his back had turned again before shoving Bones’ discarded t-shirt into his bike’s side compartment. ‘Ready?’

‘Race you there?’ he asked brightly, jumping astride his bike.

‘You’ve got to be kidding me.’ Bones raised a scolding eyebrow, protectively stroking Tara’s long neck.

‘Don’t want to make Chris wait, do we?’

Bones smiled back, a bright thing briefly stripped of sadness. ‘See you there, kid.’

Wasting no time, Jim revved the engine to life and circled wide of Bones and Tara as he peeled off across the desert. Their time on Earth with Chris was running short, so short that he refused to delay their pleasure any longer than the time of a swift ride across the Mojave.

Their time was so short that Jim could only hope that the _later_ he had suggested to Bones may never come at all.


End file.
